VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis says he hasn’t even considered issuing norms to control future papal resignations and plans to proceed for so long as he can as bishop of Rome, despite a wave of attacks by some top-ranked cardinals and bishops.
In his first interview because the Dec. 31 death of retired Pope Benedict XVI, Francis addressed his health, his critics and the following phase of his pontificate, which marks its tenth anniversary in March without Benedict’s shadow within the background.
“I’m in good health. For my age, I’m normal,” the 86-year-old pontiff said Tuesday, though he revealed that diverticulosis, or bulges in his intestinal wall, had “returned.” Francis had 33 centimeters (13 inches) of his large intestine removed in 2021 due to what the Vatican said was inflammation that caused a narrowing of his colon.
He added that a slight bone fracture in his knee from a fall had healed without surgery after laser and magnet therapy.
“I would die tomorrow, but it surely’s under control. I’m in good health,” he told The Associated Press along with his typical wry humorousness.
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Speculation about Francis’ health and the longer term of his pontificate has only risen following the death of Benedict, whose 2013 resignation marked a turning point for the Catholic Church as the primary pontiff in six centuries to retire.
Some commentators consider Francis could be freer to maneuver now that Benedict, who lived out his 10-year retirement within the Vatican, is gone. Others suggest that any kind of ecclesial peace that had reigned was over and that Francis is now more exposed to critics, deprived of the moderating influence Benedict played in keeping the conservative Catholic fringe at bay.
Francis acknowledged the knives were out, but seemed almost sanguine about it.
“I wouldn’t relate it to Benedict, but due to the wear-and-tear of a government of 10 years,” Francis said of his papacy. At first, his election was greeted with a way of “surprise” a couple of South American pope, then got here discomfort “after they began to see my flaws and didn’t like them,” he said.
“The one thing I ask is that they do it to my face, because that’s how all of us grow, right?” he added.
Francis praised Benedict as a “gentleman,” and said of his death: “I lost a dad.”
“For me, he was a security. Within the face of a doubt, I’d ask for the automotive and go to the monastery and ask,” he said of his visits to Benedict’s retirement home for counsel. “I lost an excellent companion.”
Some cardinals and canon lawyers have said the Vatican must issue norms to control future papal retirements to stop the few hiccups that occurred during Benedict’s unexpectedly long retirement, during which he remained some extent of reference for some conservatives and traditionalists who refused to acknowledge Francis’ legitimacy.
From the name Benedict selected (emeritus pope) to the (white) cassock he wore to his occasional public remarks (on priestly celibacy and sex abuse), these commentators said norms must clarify there is barely one reigning pope for the sake of the unity of the church.
Francis said issuing such norms hadn’t even occurred to him.
“I’m telling you the reality,” he said, adding that the Vatican needed more experience with papal retirements before getting down to “regularize or regulate” them.
Francis has said Benedict “opened the door” to future resignations, and that he too would consider stepping down. He repeated Tuesday that if he were to resign he’d be called the emeritus bishop of Rome and would live within the residence for retired priests within the diocese of Rome.
Francis said Benedict’s decision to live in a converted monastery within the Vatican Gardens was a “good intermediate solution,” but that future retired popes might need to do things in another way.
“He was still ‘enslaved’ as a pope, no?” Francis said. “Of the vision of a pope, of a system. ‘Slave’ in the nice sense of the word: In that he wasn’t completely free, as he would have liked to have returned to his Germany and continued studying theology.”
By one calculation, Benedict’s death removes the principal obstacle to Francis resigning, because the prospect of two pensioner popes was never an option. But Francis said Benedict’s death hadn’t altered his calculations. “It didn’t even occur to me to jot down a will,” he said.
As for his own near-term future, Francis emphasized his role as “bishop of Rome” versus pontiff and said of his plans: “Proceed being bishop, bishop of Rome in communion with all of the bishops of the world.” He said he desired to put to rest the concept of the papacy as an influence player or papal “court.”
Francis also addressed the criticism from cardinals and bishops that burst into public within the weeks since Benedict’s death, saying it’s unpleasant — “like a rash that bothers you a bit” — but that is healthier than keeping it under wraps.
“You favor that they don’t criticize, for the sake of tranquility,” Francis said. “But I prefer that they do it because which means there’s freedom to talk.”
“If it’s not like this, there could be a dictatorship of distance, as I call it, where the emperor is there and nobody can tell him anything. No, allow them to speak because … criticism lets you grow and improve things.”
The primary salvo within the wave of attacks got here from Benedict’s longtime secretary, Archbishop Georg Gaenswein, who revealed the bad blood that amassed over the past 10 years in a tell-all memoir published in the times after Benedict’s funeral.
In one of the crucial explosive sections, Gaenswein revealed that Benedict learned by reading the Vatican each day newspaper L’Osservatore Romano that Francis had reversed certainly one of the previous pope’s most important liturgical decisions and re-imposed restrictions on celebrating the Old Latin Mass.
A couple of days later, the Vatican was rattled anew by the death of one other conservative stalwart, Cardinal George Pell, and revelations that Pell was the creator of a devastating memorandum that circulated last 12 months that called the Francis pontificate a “disaster” and a “catastrophe.”
The memo, which was initially published under the pseudonym “Demos,” listed all the issues within the Vatican under Francis, from its precarious funds to the pontiff’s preaching style, and issued bullet points for what a future pope should do to repair them.
Francis acknowledged Pell’s criticism but still sang his praises for having been his “right-hand man” on reforming the Vatican’s funds as his first economy minister.
“Although they are saying he criticized me, wonderful, he has the best. Criticism is a human right,” Francis said. But he added: “He was an amazing guy. Great.”
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